Slitherine

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ORIGINAL: obvert

quote:

ORIGINAL: MakeeLearn

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says ‘enormous evidence’ for Wuhan lab coronavirus origin
May 03, 2020


https://www.oregonlive.com/business/2020/05/secretary-of-state-mike-pompeo-says-enormous-evidence-for-wuhan-lab-coronavirus-origin.html


"WASHINGTON — U.S. Secretary of State Michael Pompeo said “enormous evidence” shows the novel coronavirus outbreak began in a laboratory in Wuhan, China, and that Beijing has refused to give international scientists access to learn what happened.

“I can tell you that there is a significant amount of evidence that this came from that laboratory in Wuhan,” Pompeo said on ABC’s “This Week,” broadcast Sunday. “These are not the first times that we’ve had a world exposed to viruses as a result of failures in a Chinese lab.”"

Interesting. You picked this from The Oregonian, my hometown rag.

A headline search showed a story on this ran in virtually every paper.

I prefer the take of the Guardian. It shows some real teeth instead of simply reporting the quote, making sure to mention he did not provide any of the evidence he claimed he had seen and also showing the part where he got a bit confused about whether the virus was manmade in origin.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/03/mike-pompeo-donald-trump-coronavirus-chinese-laboratory


The US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, claimed on Sunday there is “enormous evidence” the coronavirus outbreak originated in a Chinese laboratory – but did not provide any of the alleged evidence.

Pompeo’s claims, made in an interview with ABC’s This Week, represented an escalation in rhetoric. He had previously said the US was looking into the possibility the virus came from a lab in Wuhan, China.

On Sunday, Pompeo said: “There is enormous evidence that that’s where this began,” later adding: “I can tell you that there is a significant amount of evidence that this came from that laboratory in Wuhan.”

At one point, the secretary of state appeared confused over whether he was claiming the Sars-CoV-2 virus (which causes the Covid-19 disease) was deliberately engineered or escaped as the result of a lab accident.

“Look, the best experts so far seem to think it was manmade. I have no reason to disbelieve that at this point,” he said.

But when he was reminded that US intelligence had issued a formal statement noting the opposite – that the scientific consensus was that the virus was not manmade or genetically modified – Pompeo replied: “That’s right. I agree with that.”

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ORIGINAL: Lowpe
I can't fathom a country that would release a virus among their own population...

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ORIGINAL: Lowpe


I can't fathom a country that would release a virus among their own population...but there are troubling experiments I can think of: radiation in salt for snow in St Louis, studying syphilis another. Perhaps I am an innocent still.

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ORIGINAL: Chickenboy

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ORIGINAL: Lowpe
I can't fathom a country that would release a virus among their own population...

Lowpe, you don't have to go back very far in Chinese history to see woeful treatment of the people for any number of reasons, some political, some otherwise. "Great Leap Forward", "Cultural Revolution", "Tianamen Square massacre" as a sacrifice for their politics.

The great Yellow River flood of 1938, which killed 900,000-3.4MM Chinese was an experiment in irrigation designed to hold off Japanese troops during their offensive. It didn't work. Chang-Kai-Shek shrugged his shoulders. Meh.

A country whose leaders are authoritarian, with no representation of the average individual is ripe for this sort of 'experiment' means to further their ends. Particularly if they don't really care about any ideas or ideologies other than their own narrow view. I wouldn't put anything past them.

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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Big sea change in projections today. I saw a few reports hinting at it this a.m., then more on CBS radio news around noontime. Then got home and found dramatic changes in the Univ. Washington (IHME) projections for the US, the states, and some other countries. These are major, troubling alterations that will have all kinds of ramifications. A few examples:

US death toll projected to increase from about 72k to about 133k (by the end of August). Georgia death toll from 2k to 5k, remaining basically level for the entire summer (this after IHME dropped Georgia by 25% late last week). UK up several thousand or more.

Major changes were made in the models, assumptions, and/or data input. I haven't seen the breakdown yet (we'll probably hear all about it from warring politicians and talk show hosts in coming days), but it had to come from some major shift in viewpoint - presumably the easing of countermeasures (Georgia increased 2.5x while states like NJ and NY rose more modestly) but possibly other factors instead or too. Perhaps information that warm weather won't have a salutary effect. What is clear that there doesn't seem to be a perceived 2nd round in the fall - these projections seem to call for a more or less steady fight in many jurisdictions throughout the summer.

As noted, projections for NJ and NY, among others, do continue to drop. One wonders how. If others states are spiking, would these states close their borders?

I hope these new projections are wrong. There is some hope for that. IF we've learned one thing it's that protecting the elderly/sick is paramount. Nobody's eased those measures yet, to my knowledge. Also, in just a short time we've learned how to impose restrictions, abide by them (more or less) and get by. And we flattened the curve so that most medical communities aren't currently overwhelmed.

There may or may not be other things going on here. It can't be dismissed out of hand because this has become so politicized. There's so much at stake. I don't think many Americans will tolerate extensive further lockdowns unless and until raging flare ups occur. Politicians who relaxed countermeasures will pay a heavy price...on the flip side, if things don't deteriorate, the popular uprising against restrictions may flip key states another way entirely.

In America, I think we're about to see the left and most of the media (all but a few broadcast outlets and nearly all major daily newspapers) aligned against the right and its fewer outlets (few broadcast, fewer major dailies, but lots of radio and internet).

I remain mostly optimistic for my region and similar non-urban regions, but this has been a tough booger.

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ORIGINAL: Sammy5IsAlive

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ORIGINAL: Chickenboy

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lowpe
I can't fathom a country that would release a virus among their own population...

Lowpe, you don't have to go back very far in Chinese history to see woeful treatment of the people for any number of reasons, some political, some otherwise. "Great Leap Forward", "Cultural Revolution", "Tianamen Square massacre" as a sacrifice for their politics.

The great Yellow River flood of 1938, which killed 900,000-3.4MM Chinese was an experiment in irrigation designed to hold off Japanese troops during their offensive. It didn't work. Chang-Kai-Shek shrugged his shoulders. Meh.

A country whose leaders are authoritarian, with no representation of the average individual is ripe for this sort of 'experiment' means to further their ends. Particularly if they don't really care about any ideas or ideologies other than their own narrow view. I wouldn't put anything past them.

In terms of death tolls I think the Yellow River Flood you are talking about is the 1931 flood. The 1938 flood is thought to have a ceiling of 800k deaths.

800k is still a frightening number.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

I've been fixed on IHME projections for nearly five weeks now. It always tantalized with the prospect of the pandemic basically ending or drastically tailing off...soon, soon, soon! Now suddenly it's presenting the prospect of a never-ending battle. Arg. I don't think I want to watch this day by day for week upon week. I think I'd rather disappear for three weeks on the Appalachian Trail, come back home and find out what happened after all. But no can do.

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ORIGINAL: Chickenboy

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ORIGINAL: Sammy5IsAlive

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ORIGINAL: Chickenboy

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lowpe
I can't fathom a country that would release a virus among their own population...

Lowpe, you don't have to go back very far in Chinese history to see woeful treatment of the people for any number of reasons, some political, some otherwise. "Great Leap Forward", "Cultural Revolution", "Tianamen Square massacre" as a sacrifice for their politics.

The great Yellow River flood of 1938, which killed 900,000-3.4MM Chinese was an experiment in irrigation designed to hold off Japanese troops during their offensive. It didn't work. Chang-Kai-Shek shrugged his shoulders. Meh.

A country whose leaders are authoritarian, with no representation of the average individual is ripe for this sort of 'experiment' means to further their ends. Particularly if they don't really care about any ideas or ideologies other than their own narrow view. I wouldn't put anything past them.

In terms of death tolls I think the Yellow River Flood you are talking about is the 1931 flood. The 1938 flood is thought to have a ceiling of 800k deaths.

800k is still a frightening number.

Yeah, you're right. 900,000 seems to be the coalesced number of deaths for the intentional 1938 Yellow river flooding. My earlier citation of 3.4MM was the (low) estimate of refugees (some estimates say as high as 10MM). Many of these refugees, of course, perished on the forced migration from the Yellow river area between Wuhan and Shanghai to Chungking and other parts West of Wuhan.

But I trust my point is not lost?

quote:

ORIGINAL: MakeeLearn

Coronavirus: patterns of illness and death mainly mirror what was already happening before the pandemic April 30, 2020

https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-patterns-of-illness-and-death-mainly-mirror-what-was-already-happening-before-the-pandemic-136572

"Given the variation in deaths, can we determine whether more people are dying in the UK from COVID-19, compared with the number of deaths from all causes that normally occur?

At the end of March 2020, the pattern of deaths was normal, but in early April the number of respiratory disease deaths (including COVID-19) climbed above the number expected based on historical rates. "


"Death rates due to COVID-19 are highest in older people and serious illness and mortality are more common in men. It would be easy to conclude that COVID-19 is a problem mainly in old people and men, yet early information on deaths from this disease suggests that patterns of illness and death mainly mirror what was already happening before the pandemic.

Most deaths (84%) occur in people over 65 years of age and two-thirds (68%) in people over 75 years. When it comes to gender, men die earlier and have a shorter life expectancy at birth (79 years) than women (83 years). The tricky area is understanding the underlying reasons some people die or become more severely ill from COVID-19. To understand what makes certain people more susceptible to this disease, we need to examine the other things that make us ill in the short and long term. "

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ORIGINAL: obvert


Without good journalism, a free press, we veer toward authoritarianism. It's very surprising to hear so much critique of it here. I hope most just mean they only like the sources they trust.

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ORIGINAL: HansBolter

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ORIGINAL: obvert


Without good journalism, a free press, we veer toward authoritarianism. It's very surprising to hear so much critique of it here. I hope most just mean they only like the sources they trust.

We are already veering toward authoritarianism because our free press is not practicing good journalism.

No one here has criticized the free press, that is your inference.

We have criticized a biased press.

And the implication further up that unlike the rest of us you are not relying on television news, which somehow places you in a superior position in your mind is both presumptive and arrogant.

I almost never watch television and absolutely never watch television news.

Amazing how you twist things to fit your perspective.

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Researchers linked two copies of a special kind of antibody produced by llamas to create a new antibody that binds tightly to a key protein on the coronavirus that causes COVID-19. This protein, called the spike protein, allows the virus to break into host cells. Initial tests indicate that the antibody blocks viruses that display this spike protein from infecting cells in culture.

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ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake

It can't simply be your pressure is at the "target goal"...you still have a pre-existing conditions. Now, if you have to be weighed on a veterinary scale when you go in to see the doctor....well....never mind.